The flexible slicing blade and support of this invention is designed for primary utilization in machines and apparatus for the forming of pizzas. Exemplary machines of this type are illustrated in two prior patents issued to one of the co-inventors of this invention. These patents, issued to James B. Grote, are U.S. Pat. No. 3,760,715 issued on Sept. 25, 1973 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,633,450 issued on Jan. 11, 1972. The machines or apparatus illustrated in each of the patents includes the mechanism which provides support for a plurality of sticks of sausage or pepperoni similar meat products in vertical orientation and a band-type slicing blade which operates on the lowermost ends of the sticks of meat to produce a layer of thin meat slices on an underlying pizza shell. The support for the sticks of meat is adapted for reciprocation in parallel relationship to a cutting plane in which the upper run of the cutting blade is designed to continuously revolve in a linear path. In each of these illustrative machines, the cutting blade which is a continuous band, is supported on a pair of pulleys disposed at an angle with respect to this cutting plane. The reason for that inclination is that the cutting blade has a beveled cutting edge and it is desired to present that beveled cutting edge in predetermined relationship to the cutting plane. A suitable motor is provided for revolving the continuous band-type blade in effecting the cutting of the sticks of meat as the support for those sticks of meat is reciprocated along a predetermined path with respect to that cutting plane.
The apparatus, as shown in these two specifically noted patents, while operative for the illustrative apparatus is not capable of performing the desired function with the degree of accuracy as to uniformity and thickness of the meat slices and proper adjustment of the thickness of such slices where the apparatus must be operative over a relatively long horizontal span. Some machines for the forming of pizza are in effect double line machines which are capable of simultaneously operating on two longitudinally moving lines of pizza shells and two meat supporting structures. With such long spans for the cutting blade in the upper run which may easily be of the order of three foot, this span is of such extent that the flexible blade is incapable of maintaining the necessary linearity throughout its entire length during cutting operations. Very frequently, during such cutting operations, the forces produced in transporting the vertically supported sticks of meat across the cutting plane and against the cutting blade, are sufficient to cause bowing or bending of the cutting blade. The blade may be either a bowed downwardly out of the cutting plane or bent rearwardly in its own plane, or there may be a multiple type deformation of blade to include both bowing and bending with the undesirable result of uncontrollable variations in the meat slices that are produced. Specifically, the blade is incapable of being maintained in a linear and planar configuration throughout its entire length in the cutting plane and results in a substantial and highly undesirable nonuniformity in the thickness of the meat slices as applied to any particular pizza. In fact, the meat slices across the entire width of a single pizza may vary to such a degree that the pizza is not particularly desirable from the standpoint of looks and, even more importantly, to obtain at least a minimum thickness slice, it is necessary to adjust the thickness of cut so that some slices of the meat will be thicker than otherwise necessary. As a consequence, the cost will be materially increased and thereby constitutes a substantial detriment to the economics of the semi-automated pizza manufacturing operations.